anatomy of a second language
by ihaveastorminme
Summary: "I don't know how to explain how it was between us during the war." How could he explain the closeness, the dependence. The greed he used to feel and the fear that always walked hand in hand with it. "I think I needed her to much to love her, in the beginning. I didn't understand it. I think I still don't."
1. Chapter 1

Childhood is not from birth to a certain age and at a certain age  
The child is grown, and puts away childish things.  
Childhood is the kingdom where nobody dies **[1] **

Edna Vincent Millay

* * *

not

_There comes a point when you just love someone. Not because they're good, or bad, or anything really. You just love them. It doesn't mean you'll be together forever. It doesn't mean you won't hurt each other. It just means you love them. Sometimes in spite of who they are, and sometimes because of who they are. And you know that they love you, sometimes because of who you are, and sometimes in spite of it._

_Laurell K. Hamilton, Incubus Dreams_

"I admit that even after we stood together at the brick of the world's end, I still don't understand you Starks."

Jon turned to Tyrion, and when he could tell nothing from his friend's face, he looked to Danny for help, who was usually more straightforward and who had more of a taste for Tyrion's riddles than Jon did. This time however, she just shrugged and took a sip of her wine.

"I'm sure I wouldn't mind clearing it up for you, if I knew what the bloody hell you're talking about."

Tyrion just looked at him for a long moment and Jon looked back, calm and waiting, almost amused really. The firelight washed the planes and grooves of his friend's face in light and shadow by turns, and made his expressions even more unreadable.

There might have been teasing in his voice, but there was none in his eyes. "Why don't you tell her?"

"Tell what to whom?" Jon ran a hand down his face. He'd had too much wine; his limbs feel heavy, his words slow. "It's too late in the night for me to guess your riddles, Lannister, speak plainly."

"You always call me Lannister when I'm annoying you." Tyrion pointed out with a lopsided smile.

Jon rolled his eyes. "Aye, is that what we're calling it?"

Danny chuckled and slouched a little more on her seat, tilting her head and looking at them under eyelids that were getting heavier by the moment. She was tired, Jon knew. The Dragon Queen's days were long and they had also had a feast tonight, which had been full of people who had wanted to be seen and heard. Twice as many as usual, because Sansa had been there as well and wherever she went, half the realm's lords and petitioners seemed to follow, these days. All three of them should have retired when Sansa wisely had, but whenever Jon came to the capital, they always spent a few hours every evening together.

They had never decided it out loud, Jon realized then. It just happened, as things sometimes happen after you have grown closer to some than you ever imagined you would be to another human being. After not seeing either of them for almost a year, Jon knew he'd missed them. Sometimes when they sat through the night like this and spoke to each other about their lives since they had last seen each other, Jon remembered that they had once been enemies and strangers. It all seemed like it belonged to another life, now.

"I was simply making an observation that nobody else dares make to you."

"As is his way." Danny added, and now Jon was convinced that they were both teasing him.

"You asked a question." Jon pointed out.

"It was rhetorical. I'm sure I won't understand even if you answer it. Which I'm also sure you won't do."

Jon huffed a laugh and leaned back against his chair. "You seem intent on breaking my balls tonight."

Tyrion shrugged but his eyes were shining with silent amusement. "Passes the time. I meant tell Sansa Stark that you love her."

Jon's smile was replaced with confusion. "She already knows."

Tyrion's slow smile was too self satisfied for Jon's liking. "Does she?"

Danny set her glass on the table, eyes suddenly serious as she made a careful appraisal of his face. "Jon?"

He looked between them then, and knew there would be no point in denying it. They knew each other too well lies to stand a living chance in their midst. So Jon looked at the chipped edge of the table instead. He didn't want to look up, convinced that once they saw his eyes, he would be more exposed than if he'd been sitting there bare as his nameday.

Danny reached out and wrapped her hand around his, the skin of her palm coarse in places he was familiar with. He had some of those same calluses from holding on to reigns and to Rheagal's spiky bones.

"You never told me that." Danny said softly, with gentleness she always saved for when she felt safest.

"There's nothing to tell."

"Don't lie, Jon."

He looked at her in the eye then. "I'm not lying."

"Are you worried what the Starks would say?" Tyrion asked. Jon's thoughts must have shown on his face too clearly because Danny immediately reminded him that, for all that Robb still called him brother and so did his other cousins, that was a choice they had made out of affection.

"They love you, but you're no more their brother than you're mine. It's been almost five years since anyone has known you as Ned Stark's bastard." Tyrion added.

Jon glared up at him. "That's not the comfort you mean it to be."

Tyrion waved his hand as if to swat a fly. "It's the truth; it's not meant to be comforting."

Jon set his glass on the table and stood. "It's more complicated than that."

He meant it to sound final. Close the discussion that was making him so uncomfortable he could not sit still, not even here.

He should have known better. It wasn't in Tyrion's nature to accept things as they were, anymore than it was in his. Jon tended to like that quality in his friend much better however, when it wasn't turned towards grilling him.

"And have you asked Lady Stark for her opinion on the matter?"

Jon couldn't help himself. He scoffed. "Don't be ridiculous."

"Oh, I couldn't. You've left no room." Tyrion said with a laugh.

"I think you should Jon. Speak to her, i mean." Danny added. "She needs to know."

Jon could not imagine why. "For what purpose?"

"Because Sansa Stark likes knowing things. Informed decisions, she calls them." Tyrion's voice got deeper, more serious. "And because she is sister to a King, a favorite of the Queen and her Hand, if I may say so myself, one of the most beautiful and well respected women in the seven kingdoms and acting Lady of the Eyrie. Don't you think it's strange that she never married again? Or that it is easy for her to remain so?" Tyrion asked.

"I do not." He knew very well how often she had to deal with marriage proposals. Unbidden, a memory of Harry the Arse came to him. "Her last marriage probably made her disavow the whole institution."

Tyrion snorted.

Danny raised an eyebrow at him, the way she did when he sassed her and she did not appreciate it. "Sansa Stark is not the kind of woman that would appreciate you taking choice away from her, Jon. I certainly wouldn't."

Jon flinched. "That is not what I am doing!"

He tried to hold down his anger at the mere suggestion he was no different from all the others who had tried to control her made his skin crawl.

"Indeed. Perhaps it just looks like it." Tyrion said with a shrug.

Jon stood. "I'm retiring. Goodnight."

"Oh come, don't be offended."

"I'm not." Jon said, and he meant it. But he could not speak of this to Tyrion or Danny. "I'm tired half drunk. It's not a good mood to talk about this." He leaned down and kissed Danny's cheek. "Goodnight. And you as well, Lannister."

"What, no kiss for me? I'm hurt."

Jon took a step towards him, unperturbed. "I'll kiss, you if you like."

Tyrion's laughter was loud and he tried to punch Jon in the balls once he came close. Would have hit him too, if Jon hadn't moved away fast enough.

"Fuck off, Snow."

"Sleep well, Tyrion."

Jon heard them speaking as he left, but couldn't make out the words. He could guess though which was why he was not surprised when a moment later, he heard her familiar steps coming after him. Jon shortened his stride so that Danny might reach him faster.

"Walking me to my rooms, your Grace?"

She took his arm with a sigh. "Well, you are my guest, after all. And you come here so rarely, I wouldn't be surprised if you got lost."

"Ghost would find me."

"Ghost is hunting. And I'm a better conversationalist, however."

"Oh, i don't know."

Danny pinched his arm, making him laugh.

They walked in silence for a long stretch, the summer breeze coming through the high windows along with the moonlight, bringing in all the scents of the gardens below. Sansa had told him that the city used to stink so badly, you could smell it five miles away, but Jon couldn't detect any of that now. Nobody dared jape about it, but she had. With a sweet smile and right to Tyrion's face, she had asked him which had been harder to do - flying beyond the Curtain of Light and having to find his way south again from further north than anyone living had ever been, or getting rid of all the shit in King's Landing. Tyrion had laughed so long and so loud that Danny had come from the other room asking if anyone had injured a bear.

"Don't you think that after all we have all been through, we should try to take whatever happiness comes our way?" Danny asked without preamble, as if she was just continuing a conversation that had been having a moment ago. She did that quite a lot and Jon had no trouble following her thoughts. Most of the time her mind was so clear to him, that he never understood those for whom the Queen was a mystery. But Sansa told him all three of them did this: speak to each other as if they lived in each others heads. Jon did not notice it, but he supposed it might seem queer to those who stood outside their strange little triangle.

Jon stopped and turned to face his aunt, his friend. The look on her face was patient and affectionate. She had taught herself patience carefully, like it was a trade to hone, ever since they had first met. He was surprised to see her looking at him that way now, as if he was being difficult.

"I am happy."

"You're content. That's not being happy. Though I am a bit miffed I couldn't tell the difference half as well as I thought I could."

Jon started walking again. "At least I'm not as transparent as Tyrion would make me."

"My lord Hand makes most people feel transparent, you should not take it personally. And I'm sure you could be happy, if you tried."

Jon sighed. "Danny…"

They stopped in front of the doors of his rooms, and Danny didn't even wait for him to open them. She just let herself in and closed the door behind him, pinning him with a stubborn stare when she turned.

"Tyrion is right."

"Not about everything." Jon removed his jerkin and threw it over the back of the chair set by the empty heath, before sitting down.

"Certainly not, but he is right about this , Jon." She sat herself down next to him. She brought her legs up on the chair and curled on the one side of it, like Jon had seen cats do. Her eyes shone in the dark. "You remember how it was when I first came to Winterfell?"

"I remember." Vaguely. There had been so much to do, so little time for anything but thinking of the next moment and surviving.

"I remember it clearly, even now. Parts of it, anyway. Like that night before we set off."

Jon frowned. "What about it?"

"After dinner, we were in a solar of some kind. Your sisters were there, each at one side of you, and your brother sitting at Sansa's right. Do you remember?"

"I remember."

Tyrion had been there for a time Missandei and Grey Worm as well, who had lingered longer. He remembered that because Arya had spent some time speaking to both. At the beginning of the night, Danny had been seated at the other end of the table, in front of Robb. Equals, Sansa had said. Both at the head of the table, in front of each other. Things like this matter, she had said, as she arranged the seating. Robb had not even questioned it. Then, same as now, he had trusted her to know. During the night however, Danny and Robb had moved, finding new seats closer to each other. Jon remembered looking at them speaking, both leaning towards the other.

Had it happened then, for them? Sooner?

"At some point, I think Arya fell asleep." Danny continued. "Or maybe she was leaning to your side just because she wanted to; I don't know. You had your arm around her shoulders, as you spoke to Sansa and Bran. He must have said something funny, because the two of you laughed. I remember because up until that point I had not seen Sansa laugh, not even once."

They both smiled at that. It had been a hard time. Jon was sure Danny herself hadn't smiled that much when she was in Winterfell, preparing to face what they all thought was their last fight.

"But she did and then she hugged Bran with both arms, kissed him on the cheek. I think he might have smiled, but I'm not sure."

He had. It had been wondrous to watch, at a time when Jon had been so afraid that his sweetest brother had been lost to something bigger than any of them could understand.

Danny bit her lip. "You all seemed to love each other very much."

She whispered this the same way she had whispered her other secrets to him, sometimes. Jon reached for her hand.

"We did. We do." He amended quickly, it made Danny grin.

"I remember I was jealous. Jealous and sad. It made me so sad, I wanted to cry."

Jon stood then, and pulled on her hand until she was on her feel as well, and into his arms. He held her for long moments, one hand against her head, which was pressed to his chest.

"I'm as much your family as I am theirs."

Danny laughed. "I know. And I'm not said anymore; I was a lot lonelier then." She sniffed a bit, but then pulled away and poked him in the chest playfully. "I have to say though Jon, I can't decide if I'm hurt or annoyed that you never trusted me with these feelings. I could have helped you."

Jon groaned, and when he stepped away, Danny let him. But he knew he would not escape this argument so easily.

"Don't mope. I have been feeling guilty for years, thinking I broke your heart or some such nonsense when I refused to marry you, only to learn now that you're in love with someone else."

She snickered at his shock. "Don't be cross, I'm teasing. You're fun to tease."

"According to Tyrion, I'm too easy."

"True, but a queen has to find her amusements wherever she can."

Jon sighed. "I live to serve." He deadpanned, and she laughed harder. He looked at her with doubt, though he could not help a smile - her joy had always been contagious.

"I think you've had too much wine as well." He concluded. He was not particularly funny.

"Maybe so." But she didn't seem to care. "I have decided I will be cross with you for not telling me after all, but I am so happy to see you, i don't think i can manage it tonight."

"I will be here for some weeks, give it time."

She pushed him. "Shut up."

Jon sighed. "Can I trust you not to speak of this to Sansa?"

Danny's smile was gentle. "It's not my secret to tell - for now. I urge you to resolve it however, because if you do not, i will."

"Daenerys." he said, but the warning slid off her back like water off the feathers of a bird.

"I am determined to see you both happy. If you're too stubborn to see to it yourself-" Her smile grew toothy and he was reminded of Drogon. "-well, isn't that what family is for?"

"Medling?"

"Among other things, yes. So I am told."

Jon sighed, but said nothing.

Danny had been there, years ago, when around a table, he, Sansa Robb had told her of his heritage and they had discussed the threat it might pose: to her rule, to her life. They would call him Blackfyre, everyone seemed to think, and try to oppose her rule by using him. Jon had never called himself anything but Jon Snow, but that didn't seem to matter to anyone else. Still, they had chosen to trust the Dragon Queen, and Jon knew Danny had seen it for the show of faith that it had been. A show of loyalty.

Varys and Tyrion had been there with them. Davos too, and Maege Mormont. Some of the bravest people Jon knew - and despite all their deeds and courage, Sansa had been the one to suggest what they had all been thinking and none had dared say.

'You could marry.' she had said. Simply, calmly. Jon had felt his heart drop to the floor, but nobody had noticed. It had been one of the rare times he had lost his temper in front of Sansa. He still remembered how her spine had gone rigid with fear when he'd shouted.

He had been ashamed after. So ashamed that he had gone to Danny and told her that he would accept whatever solution she thought worked best toward peace. Whatever would keep her safe. She had refused him, of course. He hadn't known at the time that she was in love with his brother. In truth, Jon thought she hadn't know either.

Making peace with Sansa had been harder.

"When we took Winterfell- it was difficult at first." Jon ran a hand down his face with a deep sigh. "We had both thought we were alone in the world for so long, being together was… I don't know how it was for her, but it was the only thing i cared about. Not the Others or the end of life as we knew it, none of that really mattered to me. After i learned about my mother, i was so angry, I-"

Jon sighed and smiled before he looked at Danny. "If Rheagar Targaryen had been alive and standing there when uncle Benjen told me, I would have killed him with my bare hands. Then waited till he rose so that I could kill him again." Jon breathed deep through his nose. "I don't think I've ever been so angry my entire life."

Danny may have already suspected this - she knew of his complicated feelings about his father, and had stopped trying to redeem Rheagar in his eyes a long time ago. And yet -

"Strange thing to say, for a man that died once. Weren't you angry at the men who killed you?"

"No, I felt nothing." It had been worse, that nothingness. The emptiness of death had followed him in his second life for quite some time.

He remembered being that angry only one other time. He'd been scared in truth, but anger made him feel less like he could be undone by the touch of a feather. So he'd chosen anger.

"By the time i came back from to Castle Black from Hardhome, all i wanted was to leave everything behind. So i did."

Danny looked surprised. "Really?"

She looked at him like she did not believe he would have abandoned the world to its own self, but it was the truth. It was an ugly truth, but that did not change its nature.

"Yes. Theon and Jayne had made it to the wall by then - I knew she was no Arya. I thought she was dead." He hadn't cared enough to even kill Theon for what he had done. "I was on my way to White Harbour when I heard Sansa was coming north with the Vale."

He chuckled at the memory. His only family in the world, and she had been running straight into death's arms.

He had turned around then and accepted Manderly's offer to join the northern forces. But it had not been for Winterfell, or the world, or anyone else. He'd wanted to see a familiar face again. Nothing more.

Jon leaned his head against the back of the chair and blinked at the ceiling. "I was so sure she wouldn't want to see me."

"Perhaps I have been wrong all this time. You don't sound half as clever as i believe you to be." Danny said softly.

Jon snorted. "She always called me half-brother growing up. I think I wanted her to send me away." He'd wanted her to prove to him that nothing was worth anything. He'd been sure she would.

"But she didn't." Danny said. It wasn't a question.

She most certainly had not. If there had been a warmer welcome by someone who was more glad to see him, Jon would not have been able to imagine it at the time. He could still remember the look on her face when she'd seen him. There had been so much sadness and longing in her, it was as if she'd screamed her feelings at him. He'd felt like he'd been living underwater all that time, and even so, she had reached him. She'd jumped into his arms expecting him to catch her, and to his own surprise, he had. She had not send him away, of course not. If anything, she had held on to him so tight and kept him so close that form then onwards, not being near her had started to feel like going against nature.

"So I stayed. Because she was alive and we were together." Because she had wanted him there, and he couldn't think of a better way to die. He had been so sure he would.

"And you never…" Danny let the sentence end, maybe to allow him to finish it.

Jon turned his head to looked at her.

"I don't know how to explain how it was between us during the war." How could he explain the closeness, the dependance. The greed he used to feel and the fear that always walked hand in hand with it. "I think I needed her to much to love her, in the beginning. I didn't understand it. I think I still don't."

The day he told her he didn't think he didn't think he was the same man he'd been in his first life, was the most afraid he'd been since he woke up naked and cold on the hard table at Castle Black - alive when he knew he shouldn't be. He told her that sometimes at night when it was quiet and he could hear himself, he was convinced not all of him had come back. Or maybe something else had come back with him.

She'd taken his hand between both of hers and held it so tight he'd thought his bones might bend. Jon flexed his fingers where they were resting on the arms of the chair. He could feel her hold even now.

'But you came back, Jon. '

She'd trusted him. She hadn't trusted anyone back then, but she had trusted him. The two of them the only inhabitants of the small world between them.

Danny got up and stood in front of him.

"You know Sansa Stark better than probably anyone." Danny said If you think she doesn't and can't return your feelings, then I would be inclined to believe you."

It rather hurt to hear it. A strange kind of pinch that still hadn't gotten any more familiar than the first time he'd felt it.

"Would be. But you're not?"

"No." Danny leaned forward so suddenly that it startled him a little. Her violet eyes glinted in the candlelight. "I know that you risk more than just a rejection. That she is your best friend, and you don't want to lose her. But might be that you won't. It may be that she can't love you the way you love her. But maybe she will. A chance may be a small thing, but it's something . Can you truly imagine living your whole life not knowing?"

Jon gulped, blinked slowly. "I didn't know you for so much of a romantic."

Her answering smile was bright. "Oh, I believe in love Jon Snow. Love saved my life, after all; don't you remember?"

He did. He'd been there, after all. She smiled at him like she knew exactly what he'd thought. Probably she did.

"Goodnight Jon."

Jon kissed her cheek and waited until she closed the door behind her before he found his bed. He slept little that night.

* * *

[1] I wanted this quote to open the story because it's fitting: this story will be the kingdom where nobody dies, because the show is about to become a nightmare so why not hide here.


	2. Chapter 2

_ii: not yet dawn_

_When a sadness chews at the bottom of your heart, it's as though you walk all day with your dress on backwards, the buttons facing the forest, the collar facing the village._

_\- Deathless, Catherynne M Valente_

Jon moves through the hall silently, hardly disturbing even the shadows. During the day, Winterfell hums with the shared breaths and labors of near a thousand men and women dedicated to restoring it, preparing for winter, preparing for war. But in the night it's so quiet and still, he thinks sometimes he can hear his own heartbeat. Too quiet, in truth. There are ghosts in Winterfell and in the night, Jon can hear them whispering.

It's what's got him out of his rooms and stalking the hallways, as the rest of the household sleeps. Had anyone asked he would have said he was making sure everything was in order, but the truth was he walked so that he wouldn't have to think too much. Most of the time the noise in his skull kept to a dull roar, but sometimes it did not. Sometimes he needed to walk.

As he turns the corner that will take him to his rooms, he notices the flickering light at the end of the corridor, just a few feet from his own room. It comes from the fire within, he knows. Some candles too, if she's reading. It's what she does before she goes to bed, almost every night, like a ritual. She reads missives, or goes over all their provisions and the notes that lord Manderly must have left on the books. And since she'd realized that Jon slept as little as she did, if not less, she had started leaving the door of her room open. An invitation that she had to verbalize the first few times, before she did not need to any longer. Sometimes she wished to speak to him of something that had happened during the day. Most times, she just wanted the company and by now she knew that he did too.

He smiles as he walks towards her door. It feels good to have an understanding of this kind with Sansa; little secret ways of speaking to one another - with a look, or a tilt of the head. They build these bridges to and from one another, ever so tentatively, as if they are learning a second language. He's learning his first one all over too. Sometimes he is not sure he remembers it all.

He doesn't know if Sansa understands how relieved he is that this does not scare her. So very little about him seems to scare her, in truth. Not even when he admitted to her that sometimes, when she tried to share with him a memory of Winterfell before they left, he did not remember it. That sometimes he felt as if he had come back in pieces and did not know which bits were him and which were something else. He remembers telling her how the night he was killed he saw his own body on that table before he opened his eyes and how there were times when he felt closer to Ghost than his fellow men. Sometimes he wakes up and feels like the he is only the memory of someone who was once called Jon Snow. That for all that he would die for her and kill for her, for all that he did both, sometimes there are moments, when he looks at Sansa by the firelight after long stretches of silence, and he forgets who she is.

It's one more secret they share - and it's also half a lie. He never forgets. Could never. But sometimes sorting through the fine details of himself feels he's like trying to read a page from a book while standing too far away.

He'd confessed this to her while he'd been standing on the other side of the room. She'd been the one to cross it and put her arms around him.

It hasn't taken him so long to understand that she is just as afraid of losing him as he is of losing himself. They're both lonely in their own ways, which is why they keep each other company, guarding each other. The way they've been guarding each other since that morning they met on the north of the White Knife. He still remembers how pale she'd looked, how red her hair against the snow and her grey furrs.

He had known her immediately, despite how changed she was. And she had known him, though back the he had been the farthest from himself he had ever felt. But she'd known him, and embraced him, and trusted him. And then when he told her how he came to be there, she'd released him. Had told him he was free to go wherever he wished, if he so wished. If he was tired, which he had been. If he was angry. He had been that also. She had read him like the back of her hand, he'd known it. And he could not leave her.

Where else would make more sense than being there with her?

Melisandre said he'd come back to deliver the world from darkness, but Jon had never believed it. He'd felt more like a dead man walking than a savior of anything, when he took his first breath after death. He'd felt nothing at all. He'd just wanted to float away, like a kite whose strings have been cut. Sansa… Sansa had been real. More often than not John wonders if he did not come back so that he could find Sansa and finally come home. If he had to die, he might as well die in Winterfell. He might as well be around people who loved him.

When he is in front of her door, Jon raises his fist to knock, but then stops when he sees her and smiles.

She falls asleep sometimes, even as she waits for him. Once, he found her sleeping on her desk, cheek pressed against her hand and fingers stained in dark ink, her quill an inch away from her face. Most times though she moves the long upholstered stool in front of the fire and lays there.

Only a mere three moons ago he would have never dreamed of walking in, but now he does. Sansa doesn't stir, not even her breathing changes. That too is so very different from what might have happened before, when she slept so lightly that she would always wake if anyone so much as stepped into the same room with her. But Winterfell is home, and he's done his level best to make it safe. They both have. And it never hurt of course, that whenever he smells her fear, Ghost is ever ready to spill blood. When they had understood that, both Jon and Sansa had started sleeping that much easier.

He glances at his direwolf now, curled as he is at the foot of her stool. Ghost flicks an ear and that is all the acknowledgment Jon gets.

He walks in, the warmth of her room enveloping him like an embrace. He leaves his cloak over one of the chairs and walks past her, to the fire. Adds another couple of logs to the fire stares at the flames, his mind half absent, still caught in all that he would have to do tomorrow. When his thoughts get too heavy, Jon turns to look at Sansa instead. Tomorrow is inevitable – staying up all night will not save him from it. It is much better to think about how, when she sleeps, Sansa almost looks as young as perhaps three and ten. Her hair is unbound, a red spill down her back and around her head. It softens the sharp angles of her face considerably and so does the way her cheek is squished against the pillow and her hand, lips parted just a little. If he told her that she drools in her sleep, she would pinch him, probably. The thought almost makes him laugh.

He reaches over and with the tips of his fingers he tugs the hem of her skirt to cover her ankles, and then pulls her shawl over her shoulder, from where it had slipped off. He's just about to leave her to this rare peaceful rest, when she takes a deep breath.

"Jon… Is it morning?" she asks, voice rough and sleep soaked, eyes still closed.

He smiles. "Not yet. Sleep, Sansa."

He strokes a hand down her arm and rises, but she reaches out and takes his hand in a strong grip before he can withdraw it.

Jon stops.

"I dreamt about Arya and Bran." She says slowly, eyes fixed on the hearth. "They were alone in the cold. I kept calling for them, but they couldn't hear me."

Jon stoops down next to her, covers her hand with his. She finally looks at him, the fire reflecting off the gathering tears in her eyes.

He can feel her hurt as if it lived in his own chest, a second beating heart.

"I wanted to go to them, but I couldn't move. I could just stand there, waiting." A tear falls down her cheek, disappearing into her hair, the other sliding down her straight nose. "I keep telling myself that we could see them again but sometimes it feels like just one more lie I want to believe in."

"The whole of Westeros knows the Starks are back in Winterfell. If they are out there, we will find them."

It's what they tell each other these days, depending on which one of them is standing on the dangerous side of doubt.

"It's been months and still no word…" And for the first time, she says it. They truth they've both known but never spoken, as if afraid of opening the door to something ill by giving their fear a voice. Even now, she only whispers it. "We don't even know if they're still alive."

Jon brushes away the tear from the top of her nose, her cheek. "What does your heart tell you?"

Sansa sighs and closes her eyes, clutching their joined hands a little closer.

"My heart is silent, Jon."

He doesn't know what to say. Night has a way of changing so many thoughts; it's the reason why he paces Winterfell instead of sleeping in his bed. So he just leans his forehead against her temple and takes a long breath. Hope is a dreaded thing to have in a dark place, it's true, but they also have each other.

"Everything sounds so much worse at night." He says softly and kisses the top of her head. "Sleep. It won't look so bad in the morning."

"That's what Old Nan used to say."

Jon's smile is small, but she sees it and mirrors it. "She's been right so far, hasn't she?"

He stays with her, sitting by her side until her breaths even out and his own lids start to grow heavy.

Jon knows he could sleep there as he is, sitting down in front of her fire with her hand in his, but he makes himself get up regardless. Gently, he tugs his hand away from her grip. He takes one of the furs from Sansa's bed and lightly lays it over her, taking care to cover her well. Thinks about smoothing away some hair that has fallen on her face, but doesn't want to risk waking her, so he leaves, as silently as he came.


	3. Chapter 3

_iii: the strength of my bones_

_" We die with the dying:_  
_See, they depart, and we go with them._  
_We are born with the dead:_  
_See, they return, and bring us with them ."_

_— T.S. Eliot, from "Little Gidding," The Four Quartets_

They had been marching for a fortnight, through wind, rain and the deepening cold. Some days Sansa felt numb from head to foot; others she felt like her very skin was afire and she would be relieved to crawl out of it. Sometimes she thought it would be better not to get off her horse at all, because she wasn't sure she would be able to get on again. And yet she was impatient to press forward at the same time.

What if they were too late? What if the battle was done before they got there? What if Arya…

Arya…

Sansa glanced to her right, to where lady Brienne was riding next to her, tall and forbidding to any who might think to come too close. What if Lady Brienne was wrong? What if the story Petyr had been telling the Vale Lords and those of the North was as true as he made it sound. As true as the Boltons told. What if it was Arya learning Ramsey Bolton's flavours of pain, now, in some room or cold dungeon. Her fierce little sister, dark haired and grey eyed, always scowling when she couldn't get her stitches right. They said Ramsey was monstrous…

Sansa stood from the small stool as gracefully as she could and excused herself. Before she could take her leave, Harry made a show of kissing her hand.

He'd been much more gallant to her, ever since he realized she was Daughter to dead parents; sister to dead brothers; last niece of to the heir of Riverrun. He was much more willing to be engaged to him now.

She might still have a sister, however.

Sansa didn't know in her heart which would be worse: that Arya might truly be in Winterfell, captive of their enemies; or that she might be as lost as lady Brianne believed her to be, and this was all a lie conceived by the Boltons and the Lannisters, to get a more solid hold on the North through a Stark's blood.

Lost is not dead , Sansa told herself as she paced her tent. Lost might mean free .

It was too much to hope. And that feeling was one Sansa distrusted. She distrusted most things these days.

You distrust Littelfinger most of all, or you would have told him about this.

But she hadn't. Nor had she breathed a word of it to any of the Vale Lords. Instead she had sword both Brienne and Podrick to secrecy, so that they may never repeat of seeing Arya when they had. Lovely Brienne, who had followed the march and challenged every knight in the Vale for the right to be Sansa's sword shield - again. ' I will keep your council faithfully, my Lady .' That was what Brianne had said, and Sansa trusted Brienne to keep her word. She had lost faith in men, but Lady Brienne was different. She was as brave and true as any knight from her songs, and she was no man.

As she readied for sleep, Sansa wondered if there was any truth to other tales that had come from the North. They were so ludicrous she had dismissed them, but only because she couldn't possibly believe news that was so contradictory. Jon Snow had been killed by his sword Brothers. Jon Snow had died North of the Wall, trying to save wildlings. Jon Snow had betrayed this vows. Jon Snow was trying to rally the north to save Arya Stark from the Boltons.

What was the truth?

Was her half brother a traitor? Was he a deserter? Was he even alive? She would forgive anything of him, if only he had dared the gods and stayed alive, where all the rest of their family had been killed.

She folded her aching body into the furs and closed her eyes. Jon Snow might very well be dead, so Sansa did not dare to hope. Once she might have wished to see him. Now, though Alayne Stone had been left behind and she could still have a bastard brother, Sansa's heart was too heavy to beat for such a sweet promise. But in her dreams, she was free. She dreamt she flew over the camp, and the trees, and headed north, towards home. She wanted to see her brothers and sisters more than anything, but mostly she only saw snow. When she woke, she dried the tears on her pillow as she had every morning, and steeled her face for another long march.

Whatever the truth, she would find it out soon enough.

ii

The forest was dark, its eerie quiet only broken by the trotting of the horses of their party. It made all men and women feel like they did not belong in it anymore. Nature had expelled man from it's bosom long ago. The night belonged to its own creatures now, but even so, the Vale army had dared the shadow-hours of dawn, to speed up their progress on the northern plains. They were close now, but there was no way to find out where the northern army Lord Manderly had spoken of was camped, and where the Bolton forces were moving to. Their last scouts – men from the Marshes of the Greywater Watch, had told them that Ramsay Snow, now Bolton, had taken some 3000 men and planned to attack the northern forces before they ever befell Winterfell .

The further north they went, the surer news was that Jon was indeed alive and leading men towards Winterfell. The prospect of seeing him filled her mind more than anything else and at the same time, she was terrified.

What might have become of him, after all this time? Would she even know him? Would he know her? What would he think of her?

She did not know. She'd hardly even known the boy he'd once been.

Be true , a voice whispered in her mind, unyielding, unforgiving. At least to yourself . You were cold and wretched to him .

She'd wondered on this for quite some time. She had not been cruel, that much was true; at the time, she had known nothing of real cruelty. But could have been kinder. He might remember her as the only sibling that hurt him by excluding him. As the only one who called him half-brother, reminding him that he was a bastard. They had been children, but then again, so had Arya - she had never called Jon half brother.

What would he think when she told him it wasn't his Arya held captive in Winterfell? Their Arya. That it might be some unknown girl of their age who looked like their sister enough to make a passable lie.

Should she even tell him?

Or will you use him?

Sansa dared a glance to her right, where Petyr rode beside her. The lords of the Vale, men who had sword themselves to her service. They so rarely seemed to remember she too had a mind of her own.

You need to talk to them in a language they are prepared to accept from you .

Yes she knew her lessons. Smiles, manners, secrets.

What will Jon Snow want from you?

A better question might be what would she want from him, but she already knew the answer to that. Nothing. She should want nothing, and expect nothing. There was safety in nothing.

The rider ahead stopped and Brienne called for Sansa to stop too, in a voice so low it barely reached Sansa's ears.

"What is it?" Sansa asked, eyes scanning the dim light passing through the trees ahead of her. The grey fingers of dawn were rising higher now and the mist of the morning was fading a bit, but the shadows of the forest were as thick as its chill was heavy. She could not see farther ahead than three riders.

"Something is moving in the trees over there, my lady." Brienne said, her hand going to her sword.

Sansa felt her heart start beating faster. She was surrounded by a whole army, it was true, but she had long forgotten what it felt like to be safe. One man by her side or a thousand, it did not seem to make much difference. The horses ahead spooked and their riders tried to calm them. Some of the men started grumbling. One of the officers of John Royce approached them.

"A great beast. White as snow and big as a horse." He said, sounding out of breath. "I think it might be a bear, my Lady."

Sansa tightened her hands on her reigns. She knew it was Ghost. There was not a shred of doubt in her mind, none at all. She knew it, but she was frightened too. She was so close to home, closer than she'd been in years. Her heart was beating in her throat all the way to the tips of her fingers.

"Archers ready!" John Royce shouted.

Sansa's heart jumped. "No, wait! Are you sure he looked like a bear? Or was he simply too big to be anything else?"

The officer seemed startled.

"The beast was lean, my Lady. Not like any bear i have ever seen, in truth. He seemed bigger, and did not make a sound."

Sansa inhaled deeply. "That's Jon's wolf. He is not to be harmed."

The officer did not seem at all reassured, and neither did any of the lords around her.

"With all respect my lady, we rather fear he might harm us ."

"He won't. I promise you sir, he won't." Sansa was surer of that than she was of anything else. She knew enough to distrust men, but her certainty of their direwolves pulsed with the same ache with which she still felt for Lady. She knew it with the same certainty she knew how to fly north in her dreams.

"And we cannot afford to harm him either way." She added as she met Petyr's eye and those of the lords Declarant. "Ghost is my brother's most faithful guard, as Grey Wind was Robb's. A direwolf is the sigil of my house. It's a good omen that he is here to make our way, I think."

"My lady, the beast is enormous." The captain continued, almost as if he hadn't heard her.

Sansa tightened her hands around the reins. Her palfrey protested.

"He won't harm me. I am his sister after all." Her own voice sounded so strange to her ears as it gave orders. It was a practiced tone – but not this time. This time it just was.

She dismounted, smoothed down her skirts. "Take me to where you saw the beast."

A small voice in the back of her mind was asking her what she thought she was doing.

It wasn't that she was unsure of her actions. It was only that she was afraid. But she would dare all the same. Sansa had always dared for a chance – a chance to be free, to be happy, to be safe. Never had it worked, but she would not stop now, when she was so close.

Behind her, she heard Brienne dismount and follow without a word. But someone did speak.

"My lady, I beg you to reconsider."

It was Littlefinger's voice, but it was Petyr's sharp eyes that gave her pause. But before he could speak again, Harry intervened.

"My dear lady Sansa, this is no pet you seek, nor even a wolf."

He was looking at her as if she were mad. As if he were a breath away from issuing a command and only remembered himself because of the grey fur around her neck and the blaze of her red hair remind him of exactly who she was.

If she had a grain of corn for every time a man tried to explain the north to her, she would be able to feed this army for years.

"Indeed, my lord. He's a direwolf." She knew her smile was sweet. And so am I .

She didn't even have to walk that far. Ghost had skirted the edge of the wood and was now so close she could see his outline pale light dawn. Gods, he was truly a frightening sight, Sansa thought as she took off her gloves. She shook with excitement, and with fear too.

"Stay back, lady Brienne." Sansa said softly, not daring to raise her voice above a whisper. "And keep your word sheathed, please."

Ghost stepped towards her.

More than eighty men around her and none dared speak as she extended a hand to the giant wolf. His fur was as white as snow, just as she remembered, but spattered with mud all over. His jaws were painted dark too and though Sansa could not see it well, she was sure that was blood.

I will be brave. Like father. Like Robb and mother. Brave like Arya and Jon. But she didn't know in truth, if she was afraid or just so excited that she was shaking with it.

Ghost didn't make a sound when his cold nose touched her equally cold fingers. Sansa flinched, but didn't retreat. His eyes were as red as blood. From this close she could see their unearthly shade, where before they had shined like stones in the dark. It was then that Sansa wondered if perhaps nothing had really changed, even as everything was different.

"Hello Ghost." She said, a whisper soft enough to get lost with all the other sounds of the dawn and life awakening around her. He sniffed her hand some more, her wrist and then sat down on his haunches. His head came up almost on the same level with hers.

Sansa breath shook as she exhaled. "Gods, you are frightening."

He was.

Do you remember me, brother?

Ghost was not her brother, nor was she his companion, but she had helped feed him once, when he was so small that he couldn't even lap at the milk in his bowl and nobody thought he'd live past his first days.

Look at you now...Look at us both.

Ghost inched his head forward, ears flattened against his head, tail thumping against the ground. Sansa felt her eyes burn, so overwhelmed with emotion that her heart felt fit to burst. She leaned forward, letting him smell her hair, her cheek and neck. When Ghost licked her cheek, the laugh that escaped her was pure surprise, and wet with tears. Only then did she dare to reach out and touch him, fingers brushing against the fur of his neck, his head. Ghost leaned his head forward, bumping her in the chest, and Sansa pressed her face against the top of his head, hands curling into his coarse fur.

He stood so still for her. She took a deep breath and then leaned back to look at him in those ruby red eyes.

"Will you take me to him?"

Ghost stood so suddenly it was all Sansa could do not to lurch backwards. He trotted around her in a circle, his long bushy tail almost hitting her as he did, making her smile more truly than she had in so long. Making her eyes sting. He jumped forward then, through the trees, and Sansa understood. She hastened to her horse, barely noticing the looks the men around her were giving her.

"We follow him." She said to no one in particular. "He will takes us to the northern encampment by a safe trail."

Littlefinger raised his eyebrows just a fraction at her, the corner of his lips arching up like a hook catching on flesh.

"The beast spoke thus to you?" His voice was soft and it was meant to sound light, but Sansa knew better. She'd known for a long time he didn't like her doing things he had not foreseen or could not control.

So she sat a bit straighter on the saddle before she replied. "Beasts cannot speak, my lord. I simply know."

"How?" Yohn Royce asked, though he was less confrontational. Sansa could see it in his eyes: he was in awe of her. As he had been since he had learned Eddard Stark's daughter had lived under his nose for so long, and he had not known her.

He knew her now.

"I just do. I will not fail you, my Lord." She added then.

Yohn Royce looked at her for a short moment, then nodded. "Then we follow."

Ghost ran ahead of them, and he was so fast and light that his paws seemed to barely move the ground he stepped on. Sansa felt for the first time in her life, the thrill of a fast ride, with a wolf's howl preceding her, parting a trail for her as if the hard land itself was welcoming her back.

iii

She was afraid… so afraid when she saw him . One side of her face felt hot and the other cold and both her hands shook, heart beating at the tips of her fingers. She could not believe her eyes… yet he was right there, and walking towards her, looking at her like he too was afraid to think her real; as if he too thought this moment might slip through his fingers if he so much as breathed too loudly. Like another dream had too often to believe in now.

He was the first familiar face she had seen in years. Years of missing her family and cutting out the pain by trying to forget who Sansa Stark ever was and who that child had betrayed… and all those lessons faded when Jon's familiar eyes looked at her. When she looked at him.

It was the look on his face, that trembling disbelief and open fear he looked at her with, that finally crumbled every reserve Sansa had held and made her throw every cautious to the wind. Jon Snow looked at her with Arya's eyes and their father's kind face and she couldn't… she could not stand there wondering what he would do and how she should act, as if this was a game and every part of her wasn't screaming at to cry, to run to him, to hold on to the only family she had left and never let go.

They both stood there like fools, afraid to reach for each other, and she couldn't stand it.

When she'd thrown herself at him she hadn't thought of anything else but what it would feel to be held by someone who wanted nothing of her but her embrace. How else could it be. He was Jon; she had grown up looking at his face. So she let go, and ran to him, arms around his neck. And as always, Sansa did not think it through to the end. If she had, she would have realized sooner that no matter who held her now, she could not return to being a girl and to how it used to feel to be made small and safe.

But when Jon caught her and lifted her off her feet the way she remembered him doing with Arya, years ago. The thought made ehr hide her grimace against the side of his head. She didn't want to cry, but how could she not. There in his arms was the closest she had felt to home in a long time. Such a long time. How could she not when he held her so tight she could feel the bones of her ribcage give, as needy of her as she was of him. She forgot what it felt to be afraid and to be cold, always looking for the right thing to say. Jon was there. She was with family again. Jon Snow, with Arya's eyes and snow melting in his hair, just like Robb.

She was home.

We will not fight each other will we, Jon?

That was the thought in her head when he set her down and they finally looked into each other's faces again, tremulous smiles on them that felt shy and awkward.

We'll protect each other, won't we?

But it was merely a wish. A child's prayer, again. She knew it, but it didn't stop her. On the contrary: her will burned brighter.

Please, please, please… And then… I will make it so. I will make you love me. We can find happiness again. We can. We will.

Her lips trembled but she still tried to smile, despite the frantic rhythm of her heart and the ball of grief lodged in her throat. A sad happiness they made: her and Jon Snow and everyone they had loved and lost sitting like ghosts over their shoulders.

"Jon…"

She was shaking still and her laugh was soaked in tears even though her cheeks were dry. Not for long though, she thought when she saw him smile back.

Jon Snow, smiling. When had she last seen that?

Sansa could not remember. That was what finally made her tears run down her cheeks. She could not remember.

His hand came up to her face, brushed her cheeks so softly she barely felt it.

"Don't cry." He said then, brushing away another tear and then cupping her face with both hands.

Sansa pursed her lips. "I'm not crying." She said stubbornly, even as she brushed another tear off her face, annoyed that it was there at all.

Jon chuckled then. It barely reached his eyes, but Sansa knew she was not imagining the sheen of emotion she could see there. "No, of course not. Are you hurt?"

Sansa blinked, confused.

"There's blood on your cheek." Jon explained. Sansa's hand came up to brush against her cheek, her own bare fingers feeling colder than his on her skin.

"No. No, I'm alright. What about you? Are you hurt? I heard…"

She'd heard so many things, but Jon's simply shook his head, his eyes fixed on her face, still unlinking. She was afraid to blink too. afraid that she might close her eyes and he'd be gone.

But she could also see that people were moving towards them. Familiar coats of arms of northern houses and people clothed strangely that she did not recognize, but that she could easily gather were the wildlings. Sansa took a deep breath and looked at Jon again. She felt steadier now, and the fact that neither had moved a step away from the other warmed her into smiling at him again, this time not so shaky as before.

"It's so good to see you, Jon." Sansa finally said, and so far this was the closest to a proper greeting she had given him. In any other circumstance she would have been distressed at her own actions… but even now she could not manage any regret for them. If any, she would have liked to be held longer.

"It's good to see you too." Jon's lip twitch upwards again and for a moment he seemed not to know what to say but then he gave in. "You've grown taller."

Happiness bubbled up inside her, so foreign that it made her as giddy as wine sometimes made her. It made her want to put her arms around him again and cry for a year as he held her. But she would not. Instead she raised one eyebrow at him and smiled. They would have been eye to eye but for one inch or two she fell short.

"I have. I'll be as tall as you soon."

Jon huffed something that might have been a laugh's cousin once removed - but his eyes were so warm, and so achingly familiar she felt she would burst into tears again at any moment.

"Don't get ahead of yourself, now." He said, his hand tightening around hers.

Had Sansa been any less happy than she was, she would have been terribly embarrassed by her outburst and all that followed, but she had long since understood that nothing had to be embarrassing, if only one knew how to handle oneself, after. So Sansa linked her fingers together in front of her and looked at her half brother with a solemn face and bright eyes. She would have smiled again if there had not been so many people around them now.

"It seems to me like you're in need of assistance here, Jon."

He gave her one single nod. "We are."

"Good."

When she took Jon's arm and faced the northern Lords and the Vale men, she knew what she was dong. She was aware – even more so when she met Petyr's eye and the Harry's, that a new level of the game had begun and that other than the battle for Winterfell would be fought in the field by men with swords but also in whispers. She would have to put her every strength to the test, but this was the one game she had to win.

And she would. Because the only thing that she had wanted more than to be free was to go home. It was time, she thought as the war council assembled to reevaluate the new capabilities of the northern forces. It was time for the Starks to return to Winterfell.

And when Jon offered her the seat at the head of the table, Sansa held his eyes for a long moment before she took it. This was no honorary tribute to her; it was an acknowledgment. She ached to take his hand again, but did not. She asked him to sit at her right instead.

How she missed him. It surprised her, how much. She didn't know him, perhaps she never really had, but she wanted to.

Who are you Jon Snow? Who have you become?

And just like that, her mind too knew where her safest place would be, as her heart had known the moment she laid eyes on him. It would be together that they would retake their home. And together, they would be safest.

.

* * *

[1] I have to apologize but i really know nothing of military tactics/strategy, and i am just making this up as i go. pretend it makes sense, if you can


	4. Chapter 4

_iv: alive and together_

_"I'm not used to being loved. I wouldn't know what to do."_

_\- F. Scott Fitzgerald,More Than Just A House_

"How do we know that he really has Rickon?" She hers herself ask after a moment of tense silence. She breathed deep and folded the letter and passed it to Petyr who sat at her left, instead of giving into the impulse to tear it in half.

"We don't." Willa Manderly said before anyone else could. "It's more likely that the Boltons are lying, your grace."

Willa's grandfather had not been able to contribute any men, seeing that they would be meeting the Manderly forces in battle soon. Whether they would be fighting with Sansa's forces or the Bolton's she still did not know, despite Lord Manderly's promise that his men had orders to yield when the wolves came. Perhaps it had been to prove this point that Wylla had insisted to come with her, along with some of her cousins and loyal men. They had offered themselves for what amounted to voluntary hostages… or perhaps spies, Sansa thought, looking to Littlefinger. He'd kept a close eye on the Manderlies, she knew.

"And if he's not lying? What if we attack, and Roose Bolton kills my brother?"

"Our people inside Winterfell say no new prisoners have been brought in for weeks, your grace." Robett Glover said, his deeply lined face serious. "Our people inside Winterfell say no new prisoners have been brought in for weeks, your grace." Robett Glover said, his deeply lined face serious. "Before that, no one had heard so much as a whisper of your youngest brother. If he had managed to capture the prince, Bolton would have announced it for all the North to hear."

"Still no word from Sir Davos, however." Wylla said, sounding even more despondent than usual.

Sansa sighed.

The rest of the meeting was spent discussing troupes and supply lines. She was told of the position of their forces, of the men and women joining them as they marched and Sansa listened closely, though she did not understand all of it. It was hard not to be overcome: she had expected to retake her home by force, but it seemed that the whole of the north wanted a Stark back in Winterfell almost as desperately as she wanted to go home.

Over the table she met Petyr Baelish's eye. Maybe she would not owe to him as much as she thought she would.

More often than not she looked to Jon. He spoke little but when he did, everyone listened. The northerners treated him with respect, where she could feel that their address to her was more out of courtesy. She could understand why: they did not expect a girl to be able to understand their talk of military strategies, and perhaps they were right. She knew nothing of how one should go about winning a battle on the ground. About how to choose where to make a stand, how to engage one's enemies in an open field or anything like that. But she did know about tactics; she knew how to go about winning engagements with beyond winning battles.

She knew for instance, that they had to watch themselves as they marched north, and make sure that Moat Cailing remained well manned, because once the Ironborn were done with their Kingsmoot, they would start to raid. When she pointed this out and got a fierce smile from Alysanne Mormont.

"There is another matter to discuss, your grace." Robett Glover said just as the council came to a close. Sansa looked away from the map of the north where their troops and their position has been laid out.

No one had called her by a royal title, until the northerners did so. It had been Petyr's idea, and Sansa understood why. It had been famously known that it had been Robb's own bannermen that had crowned him, declaring independence. No one but the north could crown her queen - or should - if she wanted her rule to be as legitimate, certainly not the Lords of the Vale. They could declare for her, if they so wished, but they could not name her.

Sansa straightened and linked her fingeres together on top of the table. "Yes, lord Glover."

"I must first beg pardon for the offence I am about to give." Lord Glover said then, dark eyes meeting hers.

Sansa felt Jon stifen by her side and resisted the urge to look at him.

"Speak freely, my Lord." Better to have it out, Sansa thought.

"Before I left White Harbour, I received a raven from my brother Galbart, who sailed into the Neck with Mage Mormont. They had orders from King Robb to take back Moat Cailin."

"I am already aware of this." Sansa said when Glover paused. They had just spoken of this, she thought as she glanced at Alysanne Mormont. She too had acted under the same orders, from her mother.

"My brother also told me that the late king made a will before he left for the Twins."

Sansa stiffened. She had been expecting it to come up, she had been prepared; but not like this.

"In his will, the King in the North legitimised Jon Snow, who was also named heir after him."

"And he wrote me out of the line of succession, because I was forced to marry Tyrion Lannister." Sansa said stiffly. "Is that right?"

Glover clenched his jaw. "Yes, your grace."

"My mother wrote me the same." Alysanne Mormont said then, her tone apologetic. "Your uncle Edmure and the Blackfish were witnesses, as well as the Greatjon and Jason Mallister."

Sansa turned to Jon, whose face was as if set in stone. She could not tell if it was because of anger or any other emotion. She could not read him, but then he looked at her and when he spoke, his words left no room for interpretation.

"I've already told them I don't want it. Any of it."

She would be lying if she said that did not surprise her. Perhaps she should not have let her confusion show, but she could not help it.

"Truborn children come before legitimized bastards." His grey eyes blazed and his mouth was set in a harsh line. Yes, he was angry. "You are here and Rickon may yet be found. Until he is, you are my queen. I will swear my fealty in front of a the first heart tree we come across, if you like."

Sansa shook her head. That's not what she'd meant at all, but she could not say that in front of all these people. She could not take his hand, and ask him what was the matter.

… She dearly wished this utter refusal did not make her so suspicious of him, but that was not how she had been trained to think.

"You heard the man. Besides, Queen Sansa was never truly married to the Imp. She did not consent and apparently neither did he, and the union was never a true one." Mychel Horton says, a little more loudly than he should have. Harry, who was sitting next to him and who was Mychel's friend, Sansa knew this, nodded but had the sense not to speak.

"Surely the north does not mean to be beholden to Lannister scheming!"

"As an independent kingdom, should the North even recognize the authority of the seven over their Queen? Most of the country does not keep to the seven at all." John Royce said then and there were more noises of assent from the men around her. Beneath the calmness of Royce's voice however, Sansa could feel his irritation. She'd known of course that the Vale men would support her claim over… over Jon's. She was promised to the heir of the Eyrie; speaking of her as married was an insult to their faces.

Sansa looked at the Lords around her, and into Petyr Baelish's eyes as well. He was watching her without blinking. He knew better than to intervene for her here.

"Lord Glover, what is your opinion?" She finally asked, interrupting the discussion around her.

"I am here to fight and die, if need be, to see a Stark back in Winterfell." Glover said, pale eyes fixed on her. "To avenge the Red Wedding."

Mailed fists hit the table hard.

Sansa tilted her head a bit to the side. "But?"

"But, I also believe King Robb's will is his last command. I cannot pretend i don't know it, and I cannot brush it aside."

Sansa nodded faintly. "No, you cannot. And neither can I."

From the corner of her eye she saw Jon turn to look at her. She'd startled him - and not just him.

"Sansa-"

Sansa put her hand over his arm. "I heard you, Jon, but this is not just about what you or I want. Robb was king, his will has legal repercussions. It has to mean something."

"Robb made that will under circumstances that forced his hand." Jon turned to look at the men and women around him. "The queen was a prisoner, when she was forced to marry. Her family did not consent. She did not consent. The ceremony was not executed in the eyes of our gods and now there are two armies, the Neck, a direwolf and myself between her and anyone mad enough to try to pursue the validity of this union. Circumstances have changed."

"My queen." Wylla Manderly said, speaking over the buzz that Jon's words had created.

"My lady."

"Did I understand the lord correctly, before?" She asked, looking at Mychel Horton. "Did the Imp also not consent to the marriage."

Sansa held back a smile. Wylla Manderly was smarter than Sansa had thought. "He did not."

"Is that why the marriage remained unconsummated?"

Under her hand, Sansa felt Jon's arm flex with the strain of keeping still and silent to such a a question. It was only then that she realized that she had not moved her hand away, and once she did, she slowly withdrew both hands on her lap.

"Wylla! If your grandfather were here, he would remind you one should not speak to one's queen in such a way." Alysanne scolded, but Wylla Manderly kept looking at Sansa, undeterred. The question was crass enough, but asked with wide eyes and a note of honest curiosity that would make one dismiss it for mere naivete. Sansa knew better.

"If my grandfather were here, he would want to be precise."

"Would he want you to be impudent?" Lord Norrey asked then.

"Others will ask too. It is in the mind of half the men in this room, though they dare not say it. We might as well just have it out."

"Others may ask, Lady," Jon said slowly. There was something exceptionally cold about his face and the way it was set in anger. Sansa almost did not know him. Almost. "But since the queen has already answered, I would be bound to demand to fight any man who would doubt my Queen's honor by asking again, and then let the gods decide the truth of it."

Wylla Manderly grinned in the face of Jon's threat. "And do you plan to fight all the northern Lords that don't want a woman to lead them, Lord Snow, even if she is Ned Starks truborn daughter?"

The table erupted in shouts, and Sansa was sure she was the only one who heard Jon's quietly spoken 'If I have to.'

Yohn Royce rose to his feet. "I would rather fight and die for Ned Starks daughter, than any lord or King alive."

"I will not have my honor question by an insolent child!"

Sansa did not really hear them. She was looking at Jon and he was looking back at her with an expression on his face she could not read. She doubted he could understand from her own silence how her heart ached to hold him, in that moment. She told herself to doubt all this devotion that came from nowhere, but he was her father's so. He was her brother. He too probably wanted to go home as much as she did. Who should he not be as devoted to their family as she was?

Sansa rose from her seat slowly. It took some moments for everyone to notice but they did, and she waited for them to quiet down so that she could speak.

"Thank you, my Lords." She said once they did. "The answer to lady Manderly's question, is that i cannot be certain of Tyrion Lannister's reasons for defying his father. I only know what happened, not why."

"I doubt he did it out of decency." Wylla grumbled. Some of the lords snorted at that, and Sansa allowed them a smile.

"I don't know if i could say so, lady Manderly, but out of all the Lannisters I knew, Tyrion Lannister was the only one who was not cruel."

"Well, then that really does mean the marriage is void, does it not?"

It was interesting how she had brought the discussion to this point. Interesting and terribly clever. No one could disagree without calling Sansa a liar, or asking for proof she was indeed a maid. Sansa doubted anyone would dare with Jon looking for all intents and purposes like he might murder the first man to speak of her that way.

Those green eyes on Wylla Manderly's face shone with more than just mischief.

"By all legal criteria, it does, my Lady." Littlefiger said, speaking for the first time.

"There is one last thing that I want to discuss before I leave you to your duties." Sansa said as she sat down again. She let a moment pass, so that everyone's attention was back on her. "Roose Bolton and Ramsay Snow. I want them both captured alive."

No one objected to that, at least.

"Ramsay is likely the one heading the bolton forces coming towards us, your grace." Norrey said, as he glanced back at the map laid out in front of them.

"Nevertheless, I want him captured alive, if at all possible. I do not want the likes of him or his father dying in battle." She explained. "All those they have hurt deserve to see them punished for their crimes, not just killed. The dead demand justice, my lords. And so do I."

"As the queen commands." Alysanne said.

ii

As all the Lords were leaving, Sansa caught Wylla Manderly's eye. "A word, my lady."

She was not refused, of course. Jon did not leave either, even as the others filed out of her tent and into the cold outside. Sansa waited for all of them to leave, before she let herself smile.

"That was very clever." She finally said, and Wylla grinned. Her teeth were white and though the front two were crooked, they did not take away from the loveliness of that smile.

"I am a clever girl."

Jon huffed. "If you'd been a man-"

"Yes, yes, you would have dueled me in front of the whole army and my head would have flown from my shoulders." Wylla said as she rolled her eyes at him, and Sansa bit her lip so she wouldn't laugh. "I understood you the first time, Jon Snow. But i think the queen would much rather I asked those questions, than any of those miserable lords out there, don't you think?"

She was looking at Jon, but it was Sansa who replied. "Yes, I do."

"See? Things were cleared out, there was no dueling and nobody died. I would call it a win."

Sansa looked at Jon and was surprised to find him looking unimpressed. "How very neat."

Wylla shrugged. "Not usually, but I can think on my feet. When I don't lose my temper, that is."

But then her face changed, becoming serious. Those round green eyes took on a light of their own.

"I know you doubt my grandfather, your grace." she said, voice low. "And you have reason, with Manderly men in Winterfell with the Boltons, and others about to come upon your army. I know you think you don't know who to trust, but I promise you, we are your men. Stark men."

Sansa nodded. "Yes, I'm starting to see that." She stepped forward and took one of Willa's hands. "Will you ask your cousins if they'd like to share my tent tonight? I would love to spend the night among you."

Willa Manderly's smile was almost wolfish. "They'll say yes."

"They will if you have anything to do with it." Jon grumbled.

"Oh stop being so dowr Jon Snow." She laughed. "If anything, today will finally put to rest all the questions about where you stand, since anyone will be too scared of you to bring it up again." Wylla curtsied. "My queen."

"My lady."

"Lord Snow." She added then, unexpectedly, with a smile that Sansa thought was almost flirtatious.

"Get on." Jon said, but it was not severe. If anything he sounded amused.

When the flap of the tent closed behind Wylla Manderly's dark grey cloak, Sansa turned to Jon with a raised eyebrow.

"That was rude."

"No more than she deserves."

She could have told him he needed to remember better manners among ladies, but instead she smiled at him. "I think she likes you, Jon."

He just blinked at her, like he did not understand. Sansa decided to take pity on him and not to tease him about the green-haired girl that might or might not want a kiss from him yet.

"Lady Brienne, you may leave us." She said instead.

"Shall I send for some food, your grace?"

"Yes please, and for Jon also. And make sure you rest for the rest of the day."

Brienne startled. "Your grace-"

"I'm with Jon, and I'll have Ghost. There's no reason to worry. You can't watch over me all the time, Brienne." Sansa added a bit more softly. "Even you need to rest sometimes!"

"Very well, your grace." Brinenne bowed and left them.

Sansa reached for the pitcher on the table and poured some more ale before handing it to Jon.

"She seems devoted to you." He said as he took it. Once she sat, he took the chair closest to her, and for that she was grateful.

"She is. She saved my life back in the Vale."

Jon's eyes were steady on her, in a way she remembered from childhood. He'd always been so watchul, so quiet.

"Thank you, for what you did before." She said, voice so low it was almost a whisper. "You didn't have to."

"I did." He set the cup down and when he looked at her again, he was almost smiling. "If i don't protect you, Ned Stark's ghost might actually come back to murder me."

Sansa tried to smile, but couldn't hold it for long. Neither could Jon - the memory of their father must be as painful for him as it was for her. It had been years, but that pinch inside her heart had not gone away.

She leaned on the table, a bit closer to him. "Why don't you want to be legitimized?"

"I'd rather keep my name, if it's all the same to you."

It wasn't the words exactly, It was the way he spoke them. Like there was something beneath them that he was not telling her, some meaning she would be able to grasp if she could just lift the edge of the curtain and peak behind she did not know how to - she did not know him.

"Jon…" She looked down, to where her fingers were interlaced in front of her. She had the courage to look at him in the eye when she spoke again. "You must know that I would never resent you for Robb legitimizing you. You're my brother."

He winced and leaned back, almost as if he wanted to distance himself from this conversation, so Sansa rushed on, afraid he'd interrupt, needing to make amends, somehow. She had just found him - she didn't want to lose him.

"I know I wasn't the best sister when we were children-" she pressed on.

Jon seemed startled. "That's not-"

"But I promise to love you better, if you let me. If you can forgive me."

He moved as if he meant to reach for her hand, but then changed his mind halfway, hand closing into a fist on the table and then opening again. But his face was open when he spoke. "Sansa, there's nothing to forgive."

"Forgive me!"

He huffed a laugh. "As the queen demands."

Sansa pushed at his arm, smiling. "Shut up. I'm being serious."

This time he did really smile. The change it brought to his face was stunning.

"I will forgive you if that's what you want. But you said it yourself; we were children. I promise you, there's nothing to forgive."

Sansa snorted. "Oh yes. I was delightful, wasn't I?"

He did reach out then, catching the end of ehr braid between his thumb and forefinger. "Doesn't matter. You were a child, same as I. Younger than I."

He let go of her braid and wrapped his hands around his cup.

"I know it musn't have been easy for you, being called the bastard of Winterfell." The looked he gave her was startled. "I didn't know before, but I do now. I was a bastard for a while, too."

Jon's eyes went wide. " What ?"

"I thought of you often, during that time. It gave me courage." She laughed at his surprise. "Dine with me tonight, and I'll tell you about it. And you also must tell me everything."

She reached for the cup he was drinking from and he didn't hesitate to hand it to her.

"Everything? Are you sure you want to know?"

She took a sip and then made a face at the sour taste. She didn't regret it though because it made Jon chuckle to see it.

"That's wine you brought from the Vale."

"It is, but I never liked wine anyway." Sansa said as she cleared her throat and handed him back his cup.

"I think the point is to get drunk from it, not like it."

"Whatever the point is, i always seem to miss it. And yes, I do want to know everything. Starting perhaps with how you left the Night's Watch."

His face fell a little.

"I was dismissed. I have a letter from the Lord Commander to prove it, with the signatures of five witnesses."

Sansa took his arm. "I believe you. But I know that at some point someone is going to bring it up and dare to demand your head. I want to be precise in my wording, when I offer to take their head instead." she explained calmly.

He looked at her like he did not know what to make of her words, but Sansa only smiled in return.

"You've changed." He said then.

"Haven't you?"

Jon's nod was minute, but his eyes were so sad she wished she could take the words back.

"Tell me." she said instead, gently. There was something about him that told her she should be gentle. Beneath the hardness he presented to the world, there was a brittleness she felt. Something that was one brush away from crumbling. Perhaps if he shared it, they would carry that weight together - secrets hurt less once you shared them, Sansa knew that all too well.

And he told her.


End file.
